A/N Knowing that you're going to have an emotional response to this chapter please keep in mind that I've never left you long and this is the second to the last chapter so bear with me until the next. Thank you to all who have reviewed. There may be a sequel, but this part of the story is almost over.

I own nothing

Ch 49 Choices

Summer had come full force to Stars Hollow. Jess had left at the beginning of June to visit with his mom in Vermont where she and her new boyfriend were working the Renaissance circuit. Rory went with her Grandparents to the Cape after Emily begged someone to go with them. Richard was driving her insane and the prospect of being alone with him for two weeks was more then she could tolerate. So Lorelai and Luke would have two very nice weeks of quiet for grown up connecting. Lorelai smiled to herself, but if this late June heat wave didn't break they were going to have to rethink that.

This Sunday afternoon Luke was working, Lorelai had finished straightening the house and was now drifting off for a nap. These warm languid days were making it difficult for her to stay awake after two o'clock. She even found herself sleeping at her desk. This afternoon though she had a nice comfy couch that enveloped her and just as she started to drool the doorbell rang. Lorelai sat up wiped her mouth and listened to see if she had dreamt it or if it really was the… Yep, the doorbell. She got up and went to answer it. On the other side of the door stood Tom Rhodes, Luke's CEO.

"Tom, what a surprise! Luke isn't here right now, he's at the diner." Lorelai looked at Tom and tried to think of the last time she saw him in Stars Hollow. That would be the wedding. Tom never visited here they always went to New York.

"Yes, I know Mrs. Danes, I'm here because I need to talk to Mr. Danes in private and that would be impossible there. Could you call him and ask him to come home? It's very important."

"Is anyone ill Tom?" Lorelai's stomach started to turn. She couldn't imagine what Tom would have to say to Luke.

"No, no one is sick, there aren't any deaths, it's just important that I speak to Mr. Danes immediately and in private."

Lorelai went to the phone and called. "Luke's." Her husband answered on the third ring.

"Hey Luke, Tom Rhodes is here and he wants to talk to you. Could you come home?"

"Tom who? Lorelai I can't come home right now, we just got a tourist bus and we're slammed. It's just Caesar, Ray and me since Jess is in Vermont." Lorelai could hear the diner in the background and Ray calling out orders to Caesar in the back.

"Luke, your CEO showed up on your doorstep saying he needs to talk to you because it's important. Now I don't know about you, but since he's never mixed your two lives before I'm thinking it's probably really important. I know you're busy, but do you think you could get home soon?" Lorelai didn't realize the edge she put in her voice, but it caught Luke's attention enough to actually hear what she was saying.

"On my way." He hung up without any further conversation and told Ray he had an emergency at home.

Lorelai had gotten Tom some coffee by the time Luke had reached the house. He walked in to see Tom nervously look at the ground. "Hey Tom, how's it going?" Luke knew that was stupid, as Lorelai pointed out Tom had never brought his corporation to Stars Hollow so there had to be something big.

Tom looked at his shoes and wondered how he was going to explain this to his boss. "Mr. Danes, I'm really sorry. We got blindsided on this one and it go too far before we were able to do any damage control."

"Tom, no offense, but get to the damn point I don't care who did or didn't do what until I know what the hell's going on." Luke was feeling very odd standing in front of his CEO wearing his diner outfit. He felt like he did the first time he and Tom had met, unworthy, over his head.

Tom took a deep breath and started to tell him what was going on. "We got a heads up on a story that's breaking this week about how the owner of B-D Corporation isn't so interested in family values that he let his five year old daughter grow up without a father."

Luke looked at him confused, "Who has a daughter?"

Tome exhaled as he said quietly, "You do sir."

Luke felt like he'd been hit with a two by four. "Rachel?" he whispered.

Tom shook his head. "A woman by the name of Anna Nardini. She had a daughter named April about five years ago and while no father is named on the birth certificate, some private detective apparently found out she was living with you seven months before April was born. We'll need to run DNA tests to confirm, but our people say it's pretty likely that you're her father."

Lorelai looked at Luke who was still processing this. "Wow." Was all she said, what did this mean now? Who was this little girl and how cruel was it for her mother to keep her from Luke.

Luke looked at Tom and said, "Where is this going to appear?"

"The story we got was going to run in the Journal next week. They wanted a response to the allegations."

Luke started to realize that if he had a daughter, then Anna had kept her from him for five years. He didn't get to see her born, or her first steps, or her first words. Was she in school? Luke leapt to his feet and almost yelled at Tom.

"They want a response? Here's their response. I want my daughter. We're going to sue!"

Lorelai was shocked. "Luke what do you mean, sue for partial custody?" She wasn't sure Luke understood what he was implying.

Or maybe he did. "No, I want sole custody of my daughter at least for five years. Anna had her for that long, now I want her. Tom, find me a lawyer a shark who will make sure I get custody of my daughter!"

Lorelai was shocked at what he was saying, he couldn't mean it. "Luke, I know you're upset you have every right. If this is your daughter then to have her kept from you for so long is horrible. But you can't take this little girl away from her mother. Sue for partial custody and visitation, but not full custody."

Luke's eyes were blazing. "No! She's had her for five years and now it's my turn. I deserve the right to raise my daughter! How could she keep her from me for so long?"

"Luke, think this through. If you get a lawyer and pull Anna into court you're going to be just like my parents or Straub or even your grandfather. You're going to use resources that Anna won't have to get the outcome you want. Anyone could look at her life and create enough innuendo to make her look like a bad mother. If my parents knew what I was doing Rory would've been gone the first year we lived in Stars Hollow!"

Lorelai wanted him to get through his pain long enough to think about his daughter.

"Lorelai this isn't about you!"

"Yes it is! I lived in a potting shed for ten years Luke! I fed my daughter with leftovers from the Inn and free handouts from guys I dated. If anyone deserved to have her daughter taken away it was me! What Anna did was despicable, but she is me. Can't you see this? This lawyer you're talking about will look at her life and destroy her in front of her little girl. You can't do this! File for joint custody and visitations."

"She's my daughter and I've never seen her! Now are you with me or not?"

"If you're talking joint custody yes, if you're talking about taking a little girl away from the only parent she's ever known then no!"

"That isn't my fault!"

"The current administration isn't my fault either, but sometimes you have to live in the reality you have and not the fantasy you want!"

Lorelai and Luke had reached yelling levels never before experienced in their relationship. Luke looked at her with fire in his eyes and turned to go upstairs. He wasn't gone more then ten minutes. He came down carrying a garment bag and small suitcase.

"I'm going to New York to fight for my daughter. If you're not going to support me in this then that's your choice; I'll call you tonight when I get there." Luke stood looking at Lorelai defiantly and she sighed as she nodded her head.

"Luke you do what you feel you need to do. If you sue Anna for full custody we'll need to talk about our marriage and just what that means to you. No child deserves to have a parent taken away from them. If you can't figure that out then there are more problems in our relationship than Anna keeping your daughter from you. I know this is a lot to take in at one time, so take some time to process this and when you figure out that she deserves both her mom and dad, come home."

Luke heard the veiled threat in her statement and nodded. He left with Tom in tow. All the way to New York Luke was processing the fact he now had a daughter. Did Anna hate him that much to keep her from him? Would he have married Anna just to make sure his daughter had a home and that he could see her grow up? When he thought about children he always thought about Lorelai and his children. Now they both had children individually and then they would have theirs together.

Provided she took him back. Shit. What the hell had he done? Well, no turning back now, first things first. He needed to find a lawyer to get his daughter. He figured Lorelai was exaggerating about what they would do to Anna. He was sure that there would be enough to convince a judge to let him have, what was her name? April? There'd be enough to convince a judge without contriving anything, after all she kept her from him for five years.

Over the next three days Luke's life revolved around meetings with paralegals and interviews with private investigators. The shark Tom had connected him with would meet with Luke on Thursday afternoon. Every evening Luke called home and Lorelai and he'd have a short but perfunctory discussion of what was going on in Stars Hollow. They stayed away from the discussion about what was happening with Anna and the lawyer. He felt odd, but they'd not said 'I love you' since the morning he had left to go to the diner that last day. He wanted to say it, but he wasn't sure Lorelai would return his feelings.

Lorelai had watched Luke go out the door with a sinking feeling in her stomach. He was reacting from his emotions she kept telling herself. His brain would catch up with his emotions soon and he'd deal with this rationally and logically. He always did. But as the days went on and each time he called he still didn't say he was wrong, Lorelai began to worry.

Rory called each day and all she could say to her was that Luke got called to New York and since it was tourist season at the Inn Lorelai couldn't go with him. Until something was settled she wasn't sure what was going to upset Rory most and she just didn't want her to rush home. Frankly the lack of other people around allowed her to cry every night after they got off the phone without answering questions. The first night she had cried so hard she got sick and she missed his comforting hand on her back.

More than anything she wanted this to be over so they could work out the kinks and go back to being married. Each night he didn't come home made it more difficult to get up in the morning. She found herself not eating well and sleeping less. The dreams she had were very vivid and docile. She would wake up and see him beside her, just looking at her and smiling. For those five seconds in the morning she felt whole again. Then she would open her eyes for real and his side of the bed was empty, undisturbed.

Thursday evening Luke sat in a bar nursing his third beer of the night. He was screwed. Everything Lorelai said about the lawyer was true and then some. The guy kept talking about how Anna had allowed April to have a pet turtle and how dangerous these painted turtles were so she had put her daughter's life in danger. And that was the tamest of all the allegations he had developed. By the time Luke's hour was up he knew he couldn't do that to another person, even someone who had kept his daughter away from him for so long. But he didn't know what else to do.

He wanted his daughter in his life and he wasn't sure that Lorelai would take him back. When would he learn to get his emotions under control? He quite possibly screwed up the best thing in his life. He took another long drink on his beer. He played with his ring and thought about how he had let her down. He had destroyed all she thought of him, he couldn't be thought of as hero, certainly he didn't think about her heart and he really messed up as a husband. He didn't consult her in what had happened; he just went off to do what he wanted. Man he was such a jackass.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw a woman walk up and stand next to him at the bar. She looked at him and said, "Well hello Luke."

His head shot up and he looked at her with narrow eyes. "I know you from somewhere. Where do I know you from?"

"Coffee tea or me?" she said with a laugh. "I work for you, on your jet. My name's Sweetie Buntin."

Luke nodded his head and went back to his beer.

"So, you're here all alone?" Sweetie got a little closer. Luke was feeling a bit fuzzy and slowly nodded his head again.

"Want some company?" Sweetie leaned in as Luke assessed her.

"You work for me right?"

"Yep. For seven years. Of course you've only used the jet a couple times and that's only been this year."

"You know I'm married, right?"

"Well, if you don't remember, I won't either." Sweetie giggled. Her giggle was so unlike Lorelai's. Lorelai's giggle was because she couldn't keep it in, Sweetie's giggle was more forced, like she needed to appear softer than she was.

Luke set his beer on the bar and threw down a ten to cover his tab. He pushed himself up from the bar and nodded at Sweetie.